HSE researchers, together with colleagues from Space Research Institute of RAS, MIPT, and the University of Colorado, ventured to find out where the plasma-dust cloud around the Moon comes from. To do this, they compared theoretical calculations with experimental data and theorized that this cloud likely consists of matter that rose from the Moon’s surface as a result of meteoroid collisions.

On Wednesday, 16 May 2018, the President of the European Research Council (ERC), Professor Jean-Pierre Bourguignon, gave an open lecture at HSE on ‘Public funding for research & innovation: The experience of the European Research Council’. The lecture was organized by HSE together with the Delegation of the European Union to the Russian Federation.

The higher the unemployment rates in Western European countries, the more likely it is that socio-political destabilization will occur. At the same time, the highest levels of unemployment in Eastern European countries are accompanied by anti-government protests of very low intensity. This is just one of the conclusions made by HSE experts in their paper ‘Unemployment as a predictor of socio-political destabilization in Western and Eastern European countries’.

Article

Some risks of tokenization and blockchainzation of private law

The paper is focused on the analysis of the problems that may be driven by mass tokenization of the objects of civil law, i.e. the creation of a digital representations of such objects in the form of a record in blockchain where the value of such objects is transferred subsequently by means of disposal of such tokens, which is a subject of separate rights to it. The paper outlines two core problems, which were inspired by recent legislative activities in Belarus and Russia: 1) a possible displacement of existing legal regimes of objects of civil rights by the legal regime of the token; 2) the problem of definition of the nature of rights to token (in rem vs. ad personam) as well as remedies for their violations. Provisions of the Belarus Decree “On the development of digital economy” of 21 December 2017 and drafts of the laws on blockchain and ICO, discussed in Russian Parliament and Government were taken to illustrate these problems.

The article describes and analyzes the legislative politics of revolutionary regimes in Russia in 1917-1918. The author aims to demonstrate the political meaning of the form of early Soviet legislation and its legitimizing effect. The revolutionary legislators often used specific language in the new laws as a vehicle of legitimacy, i.e. to make the people comply. The two main types of legal language used by the Bolsheviks can be interpreted from the perspective of different types of legitimacy. The revolutionary strategy used propagandistic legislation, written in the language of lay people, which urged them to act according to the new law. It can be seen as a request for acts of the people to legitimize the soviets. On the contrary, the traditional strategy employed old bureaucratic means of writing and distributing legislation to the local soviets. The language used by this strategy was closed to the understanding of a lay audience and implied traditions of obeying the law written in familiar legal language, which in turn implied rational/legal legitimacy. The second strategy had already become dominant after the first months of the Bolshevik revolution. This observation demonstrates that from the very beginning of their rule, Soviet leaders approached legislative policy from a technocratic point of view, which determined the further development of Soviet legal theory and practice.

The author reveals herein the concept and determines the role and the importance of a criminal threat in the mechanism of crimes against privacy. The criminal threat is regarded in the concept presented as a real probability of a socially dangerous unlawful and criminally punishable infringement of privacy.

The paper analyzes legal issues associated with application of existing contract law provisions to so-called Smart contracts, defined in the paper as “agreements existing in the form of software code implemented on the Blockchain platform, which ensures autonomy and self-executive nature of Smart contract terms based on predetermined set of factors”. The paper consists of several sections. In the first section, the paper outlines peculiarities of Blockchain technology as currently implemented in Bitcoin cryptocurrency and which forms the core of Smart contracts. In the second section, the main characteristic features of Smart contracts are described. Finally, the paper outlines key tensions between classic contract law and Smart contracts.. The conclusion section sets the core question for analysis of the perspectives of implementation of this technology by governments: “How to align the powers of the government with Blockchain if there is no central authority but only distributed technologies”. The author suggests two solutions, which are not optimal: 1) providing the state authorities with the status of a Superuser with extra powers and 2) relying on traditional remedies and enforcement practices, by pursuing specific individuals – parties to Smart contract - in offline mode. It is emphasized that those jurisdictions, which have the most Blockchain-friendly regulations will have competitive advantage in attraction of new innovative business models and companies willing to exploit them in a legal way.

Response to Peter Schaar (Chairman of the European Academy For Freedom of Information and Data Protection, former German Data Commissioner) about the incompatibility of the Internet and Big Data with Data protection. It declares that technological development has overtaken the policy-making process and applications according to web 3.0 are likely to be far more effective at piecing together personal data than even traditional search engines.

The paper analyzes legal issues associated with Smart contracts, i.e. agreements existing in the form of software code implemented on the Blockchain platform, which ensures autonomy and self-executive nature of Smart contract terms based on predetermined set of factors. Based on cryptocurrency Bitcoin example, the paper outlines peculiarities of Blockchain technology, which is the core of Smart contracts. Then the tensions between classic contract law and Smart contracts are outlined (inapplicability of concepts of “obligation”, “responsibility”, “non-performance or improper performance”, etc.) and certain possible consequences of wide-scale use of Smart contracts in legal practice

This article is devoted to the legitimation and application of the standards of ex post and ex ante by courts and the executive authorities in the sphere of competition regulation. The postulates of ex post and ex ante are considered as legal principles. The principle of ex post is intended solely for judicial and administrative application; it has a deontological framework; it assumes that the legality of the activity of economic entities is assessed only on the basis of positive legal criteria in terms of the subjective rights violated; it is limited to a particular case. The traditional approach to the principle of ex post limits the scope of its application on the subjects and excessively expands its objects. The postulate of ex ante has a utilitarian basis which assumes the assessment of the application of relevant rules in the future. One of the main aims of the article is to refute the common view of lawyers and economists that a legislator applies principle of ex ante not being bound by principle of ex post, while it is the other way around for the courts and the executive authorities. The principle of ex ante may be applied not only in the process of the creation of new rules but also at the application stage for existing rules on economic competition. This is justified because the arguments of the courts and the executive authorities about a refusal to take into account the consequences of a decision in a particular case are not convincing.

The article is devoted to a particular form of freedom of assembly — the right to counter-demonstrate. The author underlines the value of this right as an element of democratic society, but also acknowledges the risk of violent actions among participants of opposing demonstrations. Due to this risk, the government may adopt adequate measures restricting the right to counter-demonstrate, certain types of which are analyzed in this paper.

This article analyzes the usage of legislation as a legal source in the Russian Empire through the phenomenon of the publication of law. The author argues that the absence of separation of executive, legislative and court powers had definite negative effects for lawmaking and enforcement. The legislative politics of Russian emperors could be analyzed using Jürgen Habermas‘ concept of ―representative publicness‖ (representative öffentlichkeit): to a large extent, the tsars considered law as both an assertion of authority and a means of governing. Their actions towards strengthening legality in the state (i.e. the compulsory publication of legislation) were in essence symbolic or theatrical. In fact, since the separation of laws from executive acts did not exist in imperial Russia, the legislation was published (or stayed unpublished) exclusively for state administrators. The conflict in conceptions of legality between state and civil actors in the second half of the nineteenth century was not of a merely political nature. The article demonstrates that there was a public demand for publication of legislation; insufficient accessibility of legal information negatively influenced social and economic development in imperial Russia.

Development of standards of international controllability is reviewed in the article. Institutional approach is applied to development of international legal regime of Energy Charter. Definition of controllability is connected to development of international standards of dispute settlement, which are described in the article in detail. In connection with controllability, Russian interest, defense of investment in European Union and ecological investment encouragement, is reviewed in the article.